GAME BYTES: Why are we all complaining?

Thursday

Jul 24, 2014 at 2:00 PM

The most fun thing about games culture, to me, is the comically arbitrary divisions that folks use as an excuse to be antagonistic. There are many such lines we’ve created over the years, between the hardcore and the casual, between men and women, between white people and everyone else, between solo and multiplayer gamers, between shooter fans and JRPG fans, or literally any other genre.

By Phil OwenSpecial to Tusk

The most fun thing about games culture, to me, is the comically arbitrary divisions that folks use as an excuse to be antagonistic. There are many such lines we’ve created over the years, between the hardcore and the casual, between men and women, between white people and everyone else, between solo and multiplayer gamers, between shooter fans and JRPG fans, or literally any other genre. The Internet has facilitated the creation of these ghettos, oddly enough, because it’s made it easier than ever to find other people who have exactly the same interests you do. We don’t have to make do with the people we know in real life; there’s a message board for every mindset.Of course, there’s another, greater collective echo chamber we all have to live with, known as the comments sections of press sites. Video game commenters in particular have a well-known mode of operation: They yell and threaten, and they’re not usually all that smart. Yes, there are many exceptions. No, there are not nearly enough exceptions for the stereotypes about gamers on the Internet to dissipate any time soon. But whereas in the past those commenters were pretty much just jerks opposed to any sort of social progression, these days we have more varieties of loud, threatening dumb people. The dynamic is the same, though: Somebody writes an article, and the commenters go nuts in one direction or another without any critical thought.My favorite, less socially problematic example of these new possible echo chambers involves free-to-play games. Folks are wary of these, and for good reason, as many of them are pointlessly exploitative. But because we love yelling on the Internet, sometimes we dig up exploitation where there is none.Take, for example, the mobile remake of the classic PC game “Dungeon Keeper.” Some members of the media played it when it was released at the beginning of this year, and in unison they decried it as the most horrible and exploitative experience from EA to date. Now, this is a comical assertion to anyone who has much experience with free-to-play mobile games from EA, because “Dungeon Keeper” actually represented an enormous step in the right direction for the giant publisher, as this one actually had a game attached to it. But in truth, “Dungeon Keeper” is more than just “not as bad as the others.” It’s in lockstep with the sorts of free-to-play games people hold up as examples of how to pull off microtransactions. Unfortunately, the media had a poor understanding of how the game worked and just went off on it because that’s what we do. And based on how the media described it, the commenters joined the angry pile. It was pretty sad.I say all this as someone who is not a fan of the free-to-play concept. I’d rather just be charged a single fee that unlocks all the content than be given the game with no charge, only to feel like I should be funneling cash into it. But free-to-play makes serious cash, and the games are typically pretty minimal in terms of actual activities, and so commenters like to yell about how awful the world is because the filthy casuals are blowing paychecks on the Kim Kardashian game. As if the success of these things somehow threatens the very existence of game consoles.This bad discourse would be hilarious, though, if I didn’t have to look at it every day. But I do, and some of the fun of watching people being dumb on the Internet is lost to me. Oh well. n